Following the first three issues of BOOM! Magazine, readers and fans clamored for “more BOOM!” and Italycomics aims to deliver. With the latest issue of BOOM! Magazine featuring the conclusion of CAPED and PLANETARY BRIGADE, two replacement titles are needed.

“There are just too many wonderful stories to choose from!" said Italycomics Editor in Chief Paolo Accolti Gil, "so we came up with the idea of doing BOOM Magazine Annual #1 to showcase the first issue of four titles: DEAD RUN, HEXED, POTTER'S FIELD and THE UNKNOWN."

“Then, it will be readers' choice,” says Paolo. “They'll vote from the remaining three series – HEXED, POTTER'S FIELD and THE UNKNOWN – to see which will continue in issue six. Readers can vote in our forum and in various other comics forums, to decide. This way we'll be able to keep two titles in each magazine issue. That is, unless fans force us to raise the page count!”

The most exciting year of Pilot Season begins next month, but thanks to an inside source at Top Cow HQ, fans can find out the secrets behind inception of the five new properties from Kirkman and Silvestri! Pilot Season: Declassified is filled with top secret design sketches, documents, along with trailer pages from the five properties. And the best part is the fans will determine the winning property!

"CHASE VARIANT has two distinct sides to it, "Johnston said. "One is a balls to the wall blockbuster with babes, bombs, and bazookas, an extraordinary body count and a beautiful body to boot, in the shape of the star genetically altered assassin of the series. The other is a metafictional treatise on the nature of reality, of fiction, of the stores we tell and the ornaments we collect. It's a meaningful piece of comic book philosophy that's constantly being shot at by a nearly-naked four armed tattooed walking weapon. Think Michael Bay meets Rene Descartes, TOMB RAIDER meets ANNIE HALL."

In CHASE VARIANT Johnston, Tenuta and Bagwell's assassin attempts to fulfill her missions while stopping rival governments from trying to collect her for themselves. Yet her every action is predicted by a very familiar card game being played by unknown assailants, challenging Chase's belief in self-determination.

CHASE VARIANT ONE SHOT (IS ALL I NEED), a 32-page full color comic book for $3.99, will be in-stores February 2009.

Marvel’s critically acclaimed Stephen King adaptation begins another epic volume in The Stand: Soul Survivors #1, ON SALE NOW!The critically-lauded creative team of Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa and Mike Perkins return to deliver their most thrilling story yet! Nick Andros is fed up of haunted visions from the sinister Randall Flagg, but the only person that can help him is hundreds of corpse littered miles away! Other survivors of Captain Trips keep popping up, but not all of them welcome…

Critics and fans have been raving about Marvel’s graphic fiction adaptation of The Stand:

“Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa has been brilliant in adapting Stephen

King’s novel into the comic medium...taking all the emotion and horror from the classic horror novel and capturing it perfectly. A tremendous achievement.” -- Paul Stotts, Bloodofthemuse.com

“Aguirre-Sacasa and Perkins bring King's story to life wonderfully, capturing the atmosphere of the story perfectly.” – David Wallace, Comicsbulletin.com

“Marvel's vision of The Stand remains one of the most faithful adaptations on the market. It channels nearly everything that makes the novel great and makes it work in the context of a comic book.” – Jesse Schedeen, IGN.com

Who is accompanying Nick Andros to his mysterious destination? Find out in the shocking issue The Stand: Soul Survivors #1, ON SALE NOW!

For more on The Stand, please visit www.marvel.com/thestand or www.stephenking.com.

Published by arrangement with The Doubleday Broadway Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc. This graphic novel is produced under license from The Doubleday Broadway Publishing Group and Stephen King.

"Even before its release, COWBOY NINJA VIKING has seen a reception much like CHEW's explosive launch, making it evident writer AJ Lieberman and artist Riley Rossmo shouldn't be contained to a mere four issues," Image Comics Vice President Jim Valentino said. "In a time where it's very hard to launch an all-new title, the pre-release buzz for this book has been massive. We're extremely excited to keep it going for a long time coming. Considering we've had to already double our print run to meet demand, we think the fans will highly enjoy the now ongoing series."

COWBOY NINJA VIKING is the birth child of Doctor Sebastian Ghislain, a psychotherapist who recruits Multiple Personality Disorder patients to create a unit of counter-intelligence agents called the Triplets. But what happens when those guys become out of control assassins? That’s when the deadliest Triplet of them all, COWBOY NINJA VIKING, is called in to take down his own brethren. In order to ensure the timely schedule, the series will ship in monthly arcs with two month gaps in between each storyline.

COWBOY NINJA VIKING #1 (AUG090294), a 24-page full color Golden Age-format comic book for $3.50, will be in stores October 21, 2009.

This past weekend was the Big Apple Comic Convention, presented by Wizard Magazine.

Wizard once again went out of their way to make it a great time for all.When Big Apple first started, at least from what I could remember, it was in the basement of the Church of St. Paul the Apostle. It was a small con with few special guest and panels. For a while it was really the only comic con in NYC. The only issue was, the place wasn't exactly ventilated that well. After a while, it just got too hot there. They eventually moved to Penn Plaza Pavilion, which was a little bigger.

Big Apple would have an annual larger convention, usually held in Madison Square Garden. But with the with New York Comic Con starting in 2006, Big Apple seemed to have smaller & smaller crowds. But that's all changed.

Big Apple was recently bought by Wizard Entertainment, and had their first show, under Wizard, at the Pier 94 center. This was a much better space to have a convention. There was plenty of room to walk around and not bump into people. Plus having the panels next door in Pier 92 made things easier.

Big Apple this year wasn't just a comic convention, it was a collector's convention. There were guest ranging from comic creators (Jim Lee, Joe Quasada), to media guests (Sean Young, Thomas Jane), to sports stars (Pete Rose, Yogi Berra), to video games (Nintendo), and William Shatner himself! There was something there for just about everyone.

The Wizard staff did an incredible job preparing and holding everything together.